Different, Not Damaged

by Andy Peloquin

  The memories snapped. Dahvynd burst back to reality. He lay on the ground, skull throbbing. The fingers of his left hand still gripped the baton handle, but his muscles refused his orders. His arms and legs jerked. He clamped his jaw, tasted blood. Breath burning, Dahvynd could only stare helpless at Sarge's descending axe.

  Garvey stumbled over Dahvynd's prone form, and shrieked as the blow meant for Dahvynd cut deep into his leg. As Garvey fell, a Legionnaire's short sword opened the barbarian's throat. Blood rained on Dahvynd as he scrabbled in the mud.

  "Up, Dahvynd." Corporal Veridus gripped his hand and pulled him to his feet. "Get back in—" Veridus' words cut off with a spray of blood. Life fading from his wide eyes, the corporal toppled to one side, a throwing axe buried in the back of his skull.

  The world moved in slow motion. Garvey sprawled on the ground, screaming, clutching at the gushing wound in his leg. Veridus lay silent, face stained with a permanent expression of shocked horror. All around him, 2nd Platoon fought and died. Men he'd trained with, marched with, and lived with, men he called friends, fell beneath the barbarian onslaught. He could do nothing to stem the tide of blood.

  "Re-form ranks!" Drayen, 3rd Platoon's Sergeant, shouted at his men. "Tighten up that wall, damn you!"

  Months of drilling took over, and Dahvynd jostled his shield into place beside an unfamiliar man wearing the insignia of a 3rd Platoon corporal. The man's ragged gasps sounded loud in Dahvynd's ear.

  "Hold your line, you bastards! Don't let them—"

  The solid wall to Dahvynd's left caved. He risked a glance and caught only a glimpse of the corporal's back. All along their left flank, the shield line collapsed. With a howl of delight, the barbarians charged into the breech.

  Dahvynd jerked back to reality as the axe head buried into the wooden counter above his head.

  We didn't break!

  The realization snapped Dahvynd from his stupor. His muscles responded to his commands once more. With a growl, he surged to his feet. "We held!"

  His right hand slammed into Sarge's jaw. Sergeant Gardner staggered and fell beneath the force of the blow. Dahvynd screamed as agony flashed through the twisted, mangled remains of his hand.

  Dahvynd shrieked as an axe knocked the sword from his grasp. Acting on instinct, he slammed his shield into the barbarian's face. The man went down. Dahvynd drove the shield's rim through the gristle and flesh of his enemy's neck. He scrabbled for his sword, but the fingers of his right hand refused to cooperate. They hung limp, useless. Blood gushed from the wicked gash splitting his palm in half.

  Dahvynd cradled his right hand to his chest, but he drove his left into Sarge's face twice, thrice, again. The familiar features of Sergeant Gardner gave way to a snarling, spitting barbarian in crimson warpaint. Dahvynd seized the baton and raised it to crush the savage's skull.

  Realization struck him like a mailed fist to the gut. With a gasp, he dropped the baton and staggered away from the dazed, bleeding sergeant. Heart thundering, Dahvynd leaned heavily on the counter. Blood—Indar's blood—soaked into his tunic, stained his breeches. He stared at his hands, mangled right and strong left.

  We held. He clung to the words like a drowning man to a floating barrel. They were all he had.

  He'd lost comrades and friends that day. He'd been helpless as Legionnaires lay bleeding and dying around him. Somehow, he'd survived when all the others had succumbed. Only the gods knew why. More nights than he cared to count, he'd awoken in a cold sweat, screaming into the darkness, watching himself and the men of 2nd Platoon die deaths beyond measure. But he held his position. Though the barbarians had eventually overwhelmed them, he didn't waver.

  "We held, Sarge!" Dahvynd's voice held steel. "It was 3rd Platoon that broke. We held."

  Sarge shook his head, moaning. "Landen…" He tried to struggle to his feet. Dahvynd kicked him in the face. Have to keep him down, at least long enough to stop him from carving me to pieces.

  Sarge had awoken in a physicker's tent to find his platoon annihilated, his son dead. He had no one to come home to. He'd only had vengeance. He'd murdered Indar because he blamed the private, Dahvynd, and the others for his son's death. Dahvynd had to help him, had to explain that it wasn't their fault that—

  "Oi, tailor!"

  Glass shattered, and the tailor shop grew suddenly bright as a torch landed amidst the piles of clutter. The greedy flames licked at the scrap cloths. Dahvynd leapt over the counter, scooped up the torch, and hurled it back through the window. The lit fabric followed a moment later.

  Four figures stood in the street. By the light of their torches, Dahvynd recognized Bull-neck and Man-ape. Sorrin and Layrie huddled between them. Bloodstains and purpling bruises covered their panic-stricken faces. Their confused expressions pierced Dahvynd to the core.

  "Leave them alone!" Fingers of panic grasped the base of Dahvynd's spine. "They've done nothin’ to you."

  "Get out here!" Bull-neck waved his torch close to Sorrin's face. "Before something happens to yer friends."

  Sorrin screamed as the fire singed his cheek. Adrenaline surged in Dahvynd's veins as the memory washed over him.

  Frayd shrieked and fought in vain to break free. The barbarian holding his arm sneered and drove a fist into the young private's face, snapping Frayd's head back. The private sagged.

  Dahvynd grunted as an axe bounced off his shield. His short sword opened the man's leg, and the falling body opened a gap. The barbarians had dragged Frayd to the rear of their lines. Toward the line of wooden stakes they'd driven into the ground that morning. Frayd would be one more body to decorate their lines—they'd take their time turning him into a corpse.

  Dahvynd wanted to rush forward, to help Frayd, but the private had died years ago. He'd been unable to do anything then.

  Now was a different matter. His eyes darted around the tailor shop. He'd barely managed to keep the cloths from catching flame. But if it came to a choice, he'd choose the life of his friends over his shop. Taking a deep breath, he ran his thumb over the silver bracelet. Strength and Courage.

  "Don't! I'm comin’ out."

  His fingers closed around the baton with only a mild tremor. Sliding it up his sleeve, he spread his arms wide and strode into the street.

  Man-ape grinned. "We warned you, tailor." The thug shifted his grip on the torch. "The Bloody Hand don't take no for an answer." His gaze dropped to the front of Dahvynd's bloodstained robes, and his smile wavered.

  Bull-neck sneered. "Now we get to make an example of ye. Seems like our lucky night, don't it, Ardell?"

  Dahvynd shrugged. "Well, come on then. I'm right here."

  "Oh no." Ardell shook his shaggy, ape-like head. "We ain't gonna touch you. Tailor needs his hands to work. Not much good with shattered fingers."

  Dahvynd raised an eyebrow.

  Bull-neck placed his torch on the ground and drew out an axe. "Can't shorten ye a hand, but I doubt yer friends will miss a few fingers." He placed the axe head against the back of Layrie's hand. Layrie squirmed in vain to break free. "Just have to decide which ones."

  Ardell's eyes never left Dahvynd. "All of them, Peyt."

  "S'fair, I guess." Peyt pressed the axe blade hard, breaking Layrie's skin. Blood welled dark crimson in the torchlight.

  "After this, tailor," Ardell spat the last word, "no one will refuse our protection."

  Tension knotted Dahvynd's shoulders, but his hand remained steady. Peyt's axe rose; the world slowed to a crawl. Dahvynd saw the bulging vein in the man's arm, the fear in Layrie's eyes, the sneer spreading across Ardell's face. In that eerie calm, he moved. The baton flew through the air and slammed into Peyt's forehead. The bull-necked man's nose crunched beneath the impact of the heavy oaken club. Blood spurted and he cried out, clapping a hand to his face. Freed, Layrie darted away from his captor.

  Ardell's eyes followed the flashing baton. By the time his head turned back, Dahvynd had closed the distance and drove his fist into Ardell's gut. The shaggy-haired m
an wheezed, and Dahvynd brought a knee up into his face. Ardell collapsed to the cobbled stone street.

  Sorrin darted away as the sound of booted feet echoed behind Dahvynd. He whirled, steeling himself as more Bloody Hand thugs poured from the shadows of an alley. He knocked one down, ducked a swinging stick, and came up with a blow that sent another thug stumbling. He grunted at the pain flaring in his side, but drove his right elbow into the face of the man who had struck him. He'd faced hordes of barbarians; he had nothing to fear from these brutes.

  Legionnaires wielded sword and shield, but Dahvynd had no armor or weapons save his fists. He cried out as a club slammed into the back of his mangled right hand, and two more struck his spine and legs. A blow sent him to one knee. Three clubs crashed into his head, and he fell.

  The world swam around Dahvynd, but the thump of wood against flesh and bone kept him from blackness. Boots and fists collided with his arms, shoulders, ribs, and legs. Dahvynd could do nothing but curl into a protective ball.

  The shouts and snarls of rage, the smell of blood—his blood—and the desperate terror sent his mind reeling back to Hangman's Hill. The hard cobblestones pressed against his face faded to muddy, bloodstained grass. Once again, he lay curled beneath his shield as the barbarian hordes surged through their lines. The screams of his comrades filtered into his ear through the din of battle.

  No, a part of Dahvynd's mind recognized. I'm not on Hangman's Hill.

  On that bloody hillside, he'd lain helpless and wounded as his friends died all around him. He'd failed them. He hadn't stopped Alven from bleeding out, hadn't prevented the barbarians from dragging Frayd to his torture and death.

  But he hadn't failed Sorrin and Layrie. He clung to that as the thugs pummeled him toward unconsciousness. He'd saved his friends. That had to count for something.

  A familiar barrage of curses pierced Dahvynd's pain-numbed mind. Sarge snarled and shouted. The wet crunch of a weapon slicing flesh and crushing bone sounded, and the screaming began.

  He clung to his shield as scores of hobnailed boots thundered atop him. Yet the thunder that echoed through the ground sent a surge of hope through Dahvynd. The cavalry had come!

  With a snarl of rage, he surged up from the ground, hurling a pair of barbarians to the side. He had no sword, nor a hand to wield it, but he had his shield. He slammed the rim into one's face, rushed another, blocked a pair of axes, and brought his foot up into an unarmored gut. The wild-haired man doubled over, and Dahvynd drove his shield downward. The barbarian fell and didn't rise.

  He whirled, eyes wild with fury, hatred, and a lust for death, but the swirling mass of barbarians had given way to clusters of men retreating beneath a wave of cavalry. Sabers flashed in the fading sunlight, blood sprayed, and men screamed and died. But not Legionnaires. The few remaining men of 2nd Platoon slumped, exhausted and relieved. Tears streamed down Dahvynd's face, and he raised his shield and shouted defiance into the sky. All around him, his comrades joined in the cry.

  "Easy, soldier." A soldier wearing the three stripes of a lieutenant commander reined in his horse beside Dahvynd. "They've been driven back. We've got them on the run!"

  "Run, you cowards!" The harsh voice snapped Dahvynd back to the darkness of Lower Voramis. His eyes focused on three figures rushing into the darkness. Men lay on the street around them, moaning and shrieking, a few silent corpses.

  Dahvynd looked down at his cracked knuckles and bloody forearms. His left hand clutched Ardell's axe, its edge glistening crimson. Pain flared in his skull, ribs, legs, back, and arms. But his hands no longer shook. They gripped the wooden haft without a sign of tremor.

  Beside him, Sarge hurled curses at the retreating thugs. He drove a boot into Peyt's face, stamped again and again until the man's skull collapsed, spraying blood. Throwing back his head, he howled into the night—a sound of bestial fury painted with sorrow.

  Then the sergeant turned his dark eyes on Dahvynd, cold fury glittering. Taking an instinctive step backward, Dahvynd dropped Peyt's axe and held up his hands. "It's over, Sarge."

  He tensed as Gardner moved toward him, but the sergeant looked down at Ardell. The Bloody Hand thug whimpered as he crawled away. Sarge raised the axe and brought it down on the man's wrist. Ardell shrieked as his hand jumped away from his arm. Blood spurted from the wound, and the pale-faced thug collapsed.

  "Not so tough now, are you, you bastard?" Sarge sneered.

  Dahvynd's heart pounded a furious beat as the sergeant raised his eyes. But the cold fury had given way to something else—resignation, anguish, remorse.

  "I couldn't let them, Dahvynd…" His voice cracked, and he swallowed. "It weren't right, them doin' you that way. No one does that to a Legionnaire and gets away with it." He met Dahvynd's eyes. "You're speaking true? It was Third Platoon that broke, not Second?"

  Dahvynd nodded. "We held them off as long as we could, Sarge. Gave 'em a hell of a fight. But there were too many."

  Sarge nodded. "I know." He gave Dahvynd a weak smile. "I was there, remember?"

  "For what it's worth, I'm sorry. For Landen." He shrugged. "Had I known…"

  "You'd have done your job, just as I trained you. You'd have held the line." Sarge's eyes went to Dahvynd's mangled right hand. "We all lost something that day."

  A lump rose in Dahvynd's throat. He held out his left hand, and Sarge gripped it. Dahvynd thumped his twisted hand to his chest: the Legionnaire's salute.

  Sarge studied the bodies littering the street. "They'll be back, you know. Bastards like this don't give up easy."

  Dahvynd nodded. "I know. I'll be ready for them." He had no idea what he would do. But that was a problem for another day.

  "Here." Sarge held out the axe. "You'll need this."

  Dahvynd's eyes went wide. The sergeant had wielded that axe for close to two decades. He'd never let any of the others so much as breathe on it. "But, Sarge, that's your—"

  Sarge shook his head. "No longer." The tension faded from his shoulders, and the lines in his face seemed to soften. "I don't need it now."

  Without another word, he turned and strode up the street, disappearing into the darkness.

  * * *

  Dahvynd sat on a stone bench, eyes closed, drinking in the salty ocean breeze. The smithies hadn't begun belching noxious steam or filling the air with the clang of metal. He had a few minutes before the rising sun brought the ring of hammer on steel. For a moment, he had peace. And the smell of sea lilies.

  The delicate fragrance lightened his heart. He hadn't been here in years—not since returning to Voramis. Killia had tried to bring him, but he'd never dared approach the smithies. He had to come here tonight.

  He forced himself not to think about what awaited him in his shop. Indar's body, and those of the Bloody Hand thugs on the street. The Heresiarchs would want his statement. Indar deserved a burial. Perhaps he'd lay the private beside Killia. His wife wouldn't mind the company. He wouldn't join her for years yet.

  "Oh!" The quiet gasp disturbed his peace. Seraphina stood over him. "I didn't know you were here." Her wide eyes roamed his bloodstained clothing, bruised face, and the axe in his hands.

  His words came out low, heavy. "Not for a long time." He met her gaze. "What are you doin’ here?"

  Seraphina swallowed whatever she had been about to say. "I…" She blushed. "I come here to smell the lilies sometimes."

  Dahvynd nodded. "Same." He moved over on the bench. "Care to join me?"

  Seraphina sat, shoulders stiff, eyes fixed on the ocean. Slowly the tension drained, and she let out a soft sigh.

  Dahvynd let the silence stretch on. The sound of steel on steel greeted them with the rising sun, but he made no move. He ran a finger over the words etched into the metal band. The tremor had left his hands, and the images of his past no longer tugged at his mind. He was content to bask in the chill breeze that carried the calming, familiar scent of sea lilies.

  Paint a Black Picture

  "I paint a black pic
ture because there is no other to do it."

  The paintbrush danced over the canvas, leaving trails of swirling colors in its wake. Errin twisted the worn wooden handle between slim fingers, but he had no control over it. A compulsion yanked his arms about like one of Brother Trollus’ marionettes, moving his brush as if by the Illusionist’s own hand.

  Liquid color splashed the walls, his face, the cold stone floor of his cell. Droplets of light that tried to draw his attention from the picture burned into his mind.

  He wouldn't let it. He had to get the image out now. If he didn't, it faded for good. Though he hated every one of the pictures, he'd always painted them. Unthinkable.

  A final jerky twitch of the brush, and he slumped onto his bed. He'd forgotten to breathe again. But he'd rushed to finish before the light burned him alive. A single shaft of daylight, nothing more, but he hated it. Hurt his eyes, felt like his skin was on fire. He ran a hand across the cool stone walls. Better. Shadow is much better.

  He counted the footsteps. One, shuffle, two, shuffle, three. Brother Cerimon. Bringing lunch, I hope. The frenzied pace of his painting left him hungry.

  He pulled the scratchy blankets up over his head and closed his eyes against Brother Cerimon's candle. Too bright.

  He groaned in time with the squealing hinges and clapped a hand over his ears.

  "Easy, Errin." Brother Cerimon's voice. Deep, quiet, calm. "I've brought food. Addara's soup, your favorite."

  He lowered the blanket, squinted at the man at the door.

  "S-s-soup!"

  Cerimon smiled and nodded. "That's right, Errin. Soup." He set the bowl down on the wooden cot and stepped back.

  Errin liked Cerimon. Never tried to touch his shoulder or hand. Kept far back, moved and talked quietly. Easier for Errin.

  "Another black picture, Errin?" Cerimon stared at the canvas, head tilted.

  Black? Errin wanted to scream. What are you talking about? It's right there! "G-girl..."

  Why didn't the other brothers see the images? He'd painted dozens, maybe hundreds, but no one understood what he tried to show them. He lacked the words--he only had his brush and paints. Why do they all see black?